I find it really sad that the actions of this bunch of loonies has generated a thread that's now lasted for 18 pages. They'll actually think that they're some sort of hero, when we all know that they have something seriously lacking between their ears. Every single one of them is known to someone and its that person's responsibility to make sure the culprit is identified to the authorities.
I really feel for the genuine Widnes fans who will now have to suffer in the same way that we Hull fans did back in 2000.
Their club will now be punished financially, which will obviously hinder any improvements that they were making to their squad.

The reason we see more incidents at RL than Football is not down to the people who follow the 2 sports but the way it is policed. If Football was policed in the same way as RL, there would be more violence in and around the ground. I for one find football supporters at matches to be more aggressive in their chants than at Rugby but that is just my opinion.

True - I've been watching Widnes home and away for many years and we do have a moronic element to the fans which can come out at away games. It's usually pretty low level - beer throwing, and then foul mouth abuse to anyone who remonstrates with them and the odd scuffle amongst themselves and it gets passed off as 'boisterous' or down to aggressive stewards. I'll often go and sit in with the home fans at away games just to avoid it - again, it's usually nothing actually dangerous (bar the throwing of flares), just annoying, but left unchecked and unchallenged it eventually escalates into what we saw yesterday. Someone also tried to empty their drink over Silverwood after the Cas first try yesterday, but missed and just drenched his own fans who were already so wet no-one probably noticed - but if that guy had been sat a few rows nearer the front, we'd have been looking at another incident to make the news.

The club will take action - but banning orders, whilst symbolic, are pointless as they are unenforceable without some sort of membership scheme like they had in football in the 80's, and we are nowhere near at that level of problem. Anyone's mate can get anyone else a ticket - and it's unfeasible to check fans against photo records on the way in.

Just out of interested, was James Rule (our current CEO) at Hull in 2000? If so, at least he seems to have experience of helping to get stuff sorted out, so that is something to be hopeful for at least.

Today, I'm just ashamed - no-one in RL would begrudge Cas a Wembley trip this year (expect perhaps in Wakefield!), and to be honest I, and the majority of Widnes fans yesterday who understand and appreciate the game, don't mind getting well beaten by a superior team that plays RL in that way and thankfully their fans did them proud by not reacting. Good luck to Cas at Wembley.

No it was Shane Richardson. James Rule only came to Hull when Uncle Kath tookover

Just to add that the club are not taking the position that these are 'bandwagon' fans.

4 regular season SuperLeague games left for Widnes, of which only one is at home (V Wigan). If Widnes were keen to continue identifying and dealing with these people, would it be willing to do a "wall of shame" at that game.

The clubs also have to be very careful in relation to "naming and shaming". Its one thing for somebody to be banned from RL grounds under a court order, it is something different for a club to ban an individual from attending its premises. Yes, they can do it.........but who can they publicly tell they have done it.

If you look at the NZ vid.

Significant differences.

1. It's in NZ where I'd imagine the human rights laws of the EU don't stretch
2. There are fences around the ground
3. It's one very naked bloke
4. It's an international were ticket pricing and a lack of local groupings would break these idiots into smaller sections
5. It's harder to pitch invade from row z in the 3rd tier

I have seen stewards come down hard on smaller sections of away supporters.
If it was the usual couple of 100 away fans at any game. Then they would have been toast as you can throw 20 stewards at them.

But at a full ground the stewards can't ignore the rest of the crowd in favour of one section. The stewards in place kept holding the barrier until it broke and then 2 or 3 ran through. At this point you can tell all the stewards on that side to try and get those 3, leaving massive holes in your stewarding through out the sell out crowd. But basically the numbers were too many.

As for the police, they were on route to stop the fence wreckers, when about 20-30 people had encrouched the pitch.

They calmed the barrier wreckers and then wandered down the pitch and moved the Widnes fans from that area. It's just plain nuts to expect running baton charges. Which would have no doubt encouraged more Widnes nutters to come on and have a go seeing over heavy handed tactics being used on their fellow boisterous but not dangerous supports.

Also no doubt said baton charge would end up with the fella's little kids getting a back swinging baton in the mush. Then all the do gooders and hindsight crowd control experts would be on giving the exact opposite view point.

Today and the next week is a far better time to be taking these guys out of workplaces and homes to tell them they now have to pay the price. Personally I would aim for their workplace as suddenly that 3 minutes off fame will become very pricey as they see what limited prospects they have go down the toilet. No doubt some will be trouble makers at work and this will give their employer just the right cause to be letting them go elsewhere.

One of Widnes' punishments should be that for any future big games over say the next five years at neutral grounds they supply there own stewards in addition to the existing stewards.

wonder how many of them will be coming to the next league game at huddersfield on sunday.... not many id say.

ban alcohol sale at stadiums? some grown men obviously cant handle it

The more I think about it the more Widnes should keep a book of these names and when it's all sorted out criminally and via the RFL. They should take civil action against the lot of em and sue for damages including any fine imposed and loss of income through loss of sponsorship and future ticket sales.

£1000 hit in the pocket ontop of any criminal record they get. Should square off their actions nicely.

Then when the dad can't get Christmas presents for his kids, he can explain it's cause dad was a plonker and wasted his money on a 3 minute pitch invasion cause I can't handle my drink and I'm a bit of a loser.

On the fourth video just noticed what looks like an old woman between the 10 & 20 line at 2.55. She's not getting involved in anything but WTF is she doing on the pitch, and where's her carer?

Kicking the mascot probably

I left before the end of the game, so missed all of those disgraceful scenes. I walked away from that game miserable and ed wet through. On the bright side, I thought, the Widnes fans were fantastic and that we will have a nice little payday for next season's recruitment. 30 minutes later, after I got home and the wife told me about what happened, even that has now gone.

I simply couldn't believe it when I saw images of fat, middle-aged men running around the pitch and causing much of the trouble. Right out of Benefit Street it seems. All the money put in by decent fans through season tickets, merchandise and dream tickets, etc, will be for nothing. We (Widnes Vikings) will get a very hefty fine from the RFL, and deservedly so.

A message needs to be sent out by the RFL and a strong one. I'd expect a very big fine, with 50% of it being held over in case of a repeat and a Super League points deduction. There maybe even a ban from next season's challenge cup. That's a real shame though. The club and fans have worked hard at making a go of it in Super League and one massive step backwards is on the cards.

I'm not sure what the club can really do about it. Are bans really enforceable, particularly away from home? Naming and shaming seems like it could be a legal minefield these days. Hopefully, some of these morons will be identified and prosecuted, but many will get away with it and maybe do it again.

For my part, I can't see me ever attending another away game, or big semi-final or final. I just don't want to be associated with my club outside of Widnes anymore. Those who continue to follow the team will have to do a walk of shame every other week.

Good luck to Castleford in the final. Sorry that your victory was both marred and overshadowed by some of our, so called, fans.

The perpetrators were committing a criminal offence. Just requires the police to review the evidence and make some arrests. Seems a pretty simple solution really.

As for preventative measures, I'm not entirely sure you can blame the Widnes club. As has been said, all clubs have a select group of morons - in any large group of people you will have some morons, that's just life. The question is, how do you prevent morons from committing criminal acts?

I'd suggest visible police presence is the main thing. I've been at other sporting events where a significant, visible police presence will make itself apparent towards the end of the event. That didn't happen yesterday - the stewards stood around being threatened. They need serious backup, especially at emotive games like a semi-final, and more so when alcohol is involved - as every single video shot of those Widnes fans showed it was yesterday.

So fwiw, I think the RFL need to learn some valuable lessons here and start working closer with organisations who know how to police a big crowd to prevent things like this happening. Education needs to be better in ensuring fans know that if they break the law, they will get a criminal record. Most importantly, those people who do break the law, whether it's encroaching on the pitch or assaulting a mascot, need to be sat in front of a judge.

I'm not convinced on what punishing the Widnes club will achieve, it'll only punish the people who are ashamed of what happened yesterday, not the ones who perpetrated it.

I would not go OTT. Most people have been to Widnes and know there is little to no bother at all.

Yes there was a mixture of hangers on and true Widnes fans, but in the end, if they get a day in court whether that be criminal or civil (preferably both) I'm sure that is what all fans want. I know for sure I would not be put off by Widnes fans coming over to Saints and I'm sure 99% of fans would not be put off.

Sort the issue and punish the louts, then just get on with life and rugby league.

Had to laugh at that comment.

Utter class from Webster and Carney who were like doormen refusing cas fans entree to the pitch knowing that the pathetic scouse chavs wouldn't go near them 2. Assaulting a mascot is pathetically low. An insult to football fans too.

Broadcasters and particularly sponsors will expect to see strong action taken by the RFL. As daft and pointless as it may sometimes seem, it is pretty much all they can do at the moment. I do agree about learning lessons about staging big games and working with he various organisations involved, but that won't stop the idiots getting ed up and causing trouble. If a large contingent of trouble makers want to invade the pitch, and there was abut 100 of them yesterday, it will be difficult to stop them. I'm sure there will be a few prosecutions, but can't see that solving the problem either. It seems to be a larger issue with society and has been for decades. Only football style policing can stop it and that will be way too expensive for most, if not all, Rugby League clubs.

Im from Leigh and our cricket club invited 400 Cas fans to the club before walking to the match and back again for post match entertainment.................Most seemed to have had a few sherberts and not a bit of trouble, credit to them. I also saw a few similarly tanked up Widnes fans getting up to all sorts of shinaningans. It must be something in the water that the ICI factory dumped years ago.

On the stewarding front a few posters on here haven't a clue, the widnes fans would have loved a bit more response from the stewards. One small spark from an over zealous steward would have resulted in a full out pitch brawl. Yes It would have been great to see a few "fan" ? get a good slapping and deservedly so but in the real world the restraint shown by the stewards probably stopped it from getting worse.

I have never had a problem with Widnes fans, but then again, when we travel there are enough of us to make the idiots think twice. Last time our stand was was full and we outnumbered them in on other.

I have never had a problem with Widnes fans, but then again, when we travel there are enough of us to make the idiots think twice. Last time our stand was was full and we outnumbered them in on other.

I am hoping EVERY pitch invader is prosecuted. Furthermore, social services MUST investigate the family / circumstances of the kid who had to follow on the bloke (who it seemed was supposed to be looking after him on the day).

The guy who kicked the mascot's head is the same guy that punched the mascot in the head and caused him to fall to the ground.

Pretty sure there is a video of another idiot knocking off a / the mascot's head before the one pictured kicked that one. Must have been two incidents?

I think the tiger basher has been outed on Facebook and Twitter.

The punch floored the mascot but it was some fat kn0bhead that ripped the head off when the mascot was on the floor. The guy who punched him then got it and kicked it.